Hippocampus { Spatial Models

The hippocampus is one of the most studied areas of the brain. It has attracted interest due to its position many synapses removed from sensory transducers or motor-e ectors, the putative role of hippocampal damage in human amnesia, the discovery of long term potentiation (LTP, see SYNAPTIC PLASTICITY) and the discovery that cell ring is spatially coded. It has also been studied for its role in neurological disorders including epilepsy, schizophrenia and Alzheimer's disease. Bilateral damage to the hippocampus and nearby structures in patient H.M., as treatment for epilepsy, produced a profound retrograde and anterograde amnesia, prompting extensive cross-species research to uncover the speci c memory de cit that results from hippocampal damage (the most prominent of which, in the rat, appears to be a de cit in spatial navigation).